


Girls' Night In

by Taelle



Category: Derkholm Series - Diana Wynne Jones
Genre: Female Characters, Friendship, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-12-20
Updated: 2010-12-20
Packaged: 2017-10-13 19:46:41
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,542
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/141091
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Taelle/pseuds/Taelle
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff"><p>My thanks to helpful Yuletide betas Carbonel and Yeti.</p></blockquote>





	Girls' Night In

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Morbane](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Morbane/gifts).



At first, they had settled down in the buttery bar, but Claudia kept staring at that bar stool. Not too obviously – Claudia, after all, was a fairly low-key person – but enough to annoy Olga. And to upset Melissa, which was possibly a far worse prospect for their plans for the night.

“Let’s move to my room,” Elda said then. “We can buy the drinks here and scrounge up stuff to eat there. I still have an almost-full box of oranges. It’ll be so nice!”

And off to Elda’s they went.

No bar stools, Elda thought with pleasure, choosing the most comfortable position on her favorite carpet – the chief measure of comfortableness being that it allowed her friends to settle comfortably next to her. They all thought Claudia had no need to worry about Wermacht – after all, everyone from Flury to Wizard Querida had examined him and seemed to think he’d be all right as a bar stool – but, truth be told, Elda herself was a little disturbed. It just did not seem right, to sit in the buttery and remember that the bar stool over there had taught your classes over the last year. Not, mind you, that those had been good classes. As a bar stool, he looked much more solid and dependable. Although nobody wished to sit on him, so it turned out he was not useful after all, even in the buttery.

Still. He made a disturbing sight, Elda thought, looking over her own room with satisfaction. Now, that was much better…

… and it was already very much her own room. Not that it hadn’t been very nice last year, but somehow the fact that she had gone away on vacation and then returned, thinking all the while ‘when I am back at my room in the university’, made a lot of difference.

“It’s like a second home now,” she said aloud.

“Oh yes,” Melissa answered happily, looking around. “You made it so lovely here.”

She wasn’t quite leaning on Elda as Claudia did, but sitting nearby, her feet tucked neatly under her skirt. A bit like a cat, Elda thought suddenly. Usually Melissa, beautiful as she was, had in Elda’s opinion nothing whatsoever in common with cats, especially afraid of mice as she was. Now, though… Elda worried at her own sudden image and then decided she most likely unconsciously used the idea of a cat as a beautiful creature that settled comfortably at some place and at once made it look better. Not the most essential quality of a cat, but, she decided, for a one-off comparison, it would do.

She smiled at Melissa, pleased with herself and with her guest.

Melissa was looking at the bag still hanging from Elda’s neck. That was actually a new one, with design improved from the previous year (a couple of new pockets) and also redecorated: Elda had decided she wanted a more noticeable bag, so she’d decorated it not just with her own feathers, but with some borrowed from Kit. Perhaps, she thought, she would also put some ornaments on it, but not yet. She still hadn't decided which ornaments she'd like.

“Um… Elda?” Melissa finally asked. “I was thinking… Could you maybe make me a bag? For notebooks and such? I have one, but yours is so much prettier…”

The request pleased Elda even more. First of all, Melissa did not seem as nervous of her as she used to be, and second, she liked Elda’s bag enough not just to make her own like it, but to actually ask Elda for a bag. Elda knew she was no Calette, but the idea of making things people loved had its attractions, even for her.

“Of course!” she answered happily. “Of course I will make you a bag. I can even add some feathers.” And, she thought, she’d have an opportunity to try something new, maybe use an ornament she wouldn’t use for herself.

“Oh, Elda, thank you!” Melissa made an abortive movement which Elda rather thought was the beginning of a hug, only Melissa did not know how to manage it. Or was she still fearful? In any case, Elda decided, they had to invite Melissa more often.

Elda stretched a bit, trying not to jostle Claudia, who was still leaning on her – for warmth, probably, but in any case Elda liked to have someone close. Olga was sitting a bit further off, talking to Rona and Triss from the rowing club, but when she caught Elda’s gaze, she paused.

“I almost forgot,” Olga said. “I have something for you. From Lukin and me. Well, and from Isodel too, in a way, but…” She was rummaging in her own bag, quite a comfortable looking one, though not as pretty as Elda’s. “Well, here it is.”

She took out a bundle and scrambled closer to Elda. “I hope you won’t mind it. We just couldn’t resist it when we saw it. It was at the fair near the palace – they are just starting it again, and some stuff is very good.”

She sounded a bit uncertain, Elda decided with surprise, and then saw what was in the bundle.

A teddy bear. Dressed in robes.

Elda stared at it, startled.

Finally she decided that the robes weren’t actually much like the ones the university teachers wore, but they were recognizably robes.

She poked at the bear carefully. The bear stared at her with its serious button eyes.

“If you don’t like it,” Olga said, “then forget about it. But we really couldn’t resist. Lukin and I, we both thought about you when we saw this…”

Elda laughed, almost making Melissa jump in surprise.

“I like it!” she announced. “I love it – him! He’s so much cuter than Corkoran, really, and he looks like he really should be a mage.”

Olga breathed out in relief.

“Well,” Claudia said at that moment, “you can’t make him a mage, but you can make him magical, can’t you?”

Elda thought on that a bit. The rest of the girls turned towards them, their attention most likely attracted by her laughter over Olga’s present.

“I could change his appearance, perhaps,” Elda said finally, “though I don’t think I want to make him anything like a gryphon – well, he might look fine with wings, but it’s different with living beings, more of a complicated and interesting magical task.”

“I thought,” Claudia said slowly, “we could watch how magic connects with an inanimate object. Say, if we transform him, making him, for example, a flying bear… and then add more magic…”

“You are thinking about Wermacht,” Elda said, and sighed. “Why are you still thinking about Wermacht? You don’t think it’s your fault, do you? After all, it was he who was incompetent, and made that annoying coat hanger and could have got you into bigger trouble, and it was no thanks to him that you got rid of your jinx… You did get rid of it, didn’t you?”

“I certainly did,” Claudia said with a small smile. “My escort was so surprised when I went home for the vacations – I think they had supplies for a month’s journey. I admit, I want to learn serious translocation, if only to see their faces.”

Melissa applauded, and then all the girls joined her. Elda decided she really liked Melissa.

“Well, there,” she said. “Not your fault. Everyone said he should have been able to work this out himself, if he had been a decent wizard.”

“I know,” Claudia answered. “I know, and I don’t like him, and he wouldn’t appreciate us trying to help, but… I probably wouldn’t have been able to deal with my jinx except for your brother, you know?”

“Of course you would,” Elda exclaimed. “We just had no time by then, but you would’ve done it sooner or later!” She could see, though, the quiet stubbornness of Claudia’s look.

“I didn’t manage it at all over last year, did I?” Claudia sighed. “Besides, it’s just troubling to see him standing there. I really thought he’d be out of that bar stool by the end of our vacations, but it’s still in the buttery.”

“Well, we could put it somewhere else,” said Olga. “Send it to Wizard Querida, perhaps.”

“Please don’t.” Claudia laughed. “Do you really want to annoy her?”

Olga had to agree that she didn’t.

Elda, meanwhile, was thinking . She didn’t like Wermacht, and the University was much nicer without him. On the other hand…

“No one says he has to teach us again if he’s back to human,” she said musingly. “He’d probably be sent off somewhere, like Corkoran. Or even sacked.”

Claudia nodded. “So while he’s a bar stool, he’s here, but when he’s human again, we’ll be rid of him.”

“Then we’re going to do it,” Olga said decisively, and when Claudia moved to object, she added, “what, did you think we’d let you do it all yourself? We’re good at group work!”

“Can I help?” Melissa asked.

Claudia took out her notebook.

It was all to the best, Elda decided finally, looking at her friends. After all, last year they had assassins and mice and the trip to the Moon – they didn’t want this year be dull, did they?

**Author's Note:**

> My thanks to helpful Yuletide betas Carbonel and Yeti.


End file.
